


All the King's Men

by anextraordinarymuse (December_Daughter)



Category: Agent Carter (TV), Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Captain America (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-04
Updated: 2018-01-28
Packaged: 2018-05-24 15:55:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6158818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/December_Daughter/pseuds/anextraordinarymuse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Less than a year after the end of the second Great War and the loss of the love of her life, Peggy Carter apprehends a man with a number for a name and a confession that will not only send her on a worldwide manhunt, but change the course of her life.</p>
<p>Six decades later, Coulson tells Steve a story that sets him on a collision course with fate - and a past that had held the only future he's ever wanted. </p>
<p>A story of second chances, because theirs is a love that even time would lie down and be still for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The basic idea for this story belongs to beautifulwhensarcastic on tumblr. She wrote this post: http://beautifulwhensarcastic.tumblr.com/post/134748716063/peggy-builds-shield-and-fights-hard-for-it-to and my imagination just ran away with me. I've added to it and made the story my own (with permission!), but it wouldn't exist without her fantastic idea.  
> Thank you so much for letting me use it!  
> As far as the timeline goes, the events of the first season of Marvel's Agent Carter and the first Avenger's movie are in tact, but I didn't adhere to that canon religiously.  
> See End Notes for more.

**Prologue**

* * *

 

**July, 1946**

Peggy wasn’t reckless by nature, but it would be dishonest to say that she hadn’t suffered the occasional bout of reckless behavior in her time. Generally speaking, her overwhelmingly practical sensibilities kept her from doing anything truly outrageous, which was more than could be said for some people (especially those with the Stark surname).

She might have anticipated, then, that her practicality would not only one day fail her, but that it would do so spectacularly. As it was, Peggy Carter had done no such thing.

The moment came less than a year after the official end of the war. Peggy was in hot pursuit of a soviet scientist who was in possession of a startling amount of medical research files that belonged to the SSR; not the least important of which was an incomplete copy of Project Rebirth’s files and, therefore, Steve’s.

Logically, Peggy knew even as she chased the perpetrator that there was nothing really of Steve in that file, or any others. There would be a picture of him at most, and perhaps a name, but that was public knowledge. Steve was in no danger now, not from this man or any other, and he never would be again.

Still, Peggy’s level of infuriation was disproportionate to the trespass. Steve might be gone, but her fierce desire to protect him was not – even if all she could protect now were the pieces of him that had been left behind. Her anger carried and sustained her on the pell-mell dash across the docks in pursuit of the thief as surely as her sense of justice did.

Jarvis was her only help until the backup she had called for arrived, but Peggy had left him somewhere down the docks to take up the chase, and so could not expect much assistance. She was on her own here.

Until, quite unexpectedly, she wasn’t: she pulled free of the narrow alley that had been created by adjacent rows of shipping containers in time to see the man she was pursuing smacked straight on by the grille of a familiar Ford. The tires had started to squeal loudly seconds before impact, which was undoubtedly the only reason her fleeing scientist wasn’t crushed by the force.

Impaling the man did not seem to be the intent, a fact that was almost immediately confirmed by the driver’s side door flying open to hastily eject a mildly distraught butler.

“Did I kill him? Bloody fool popped out right in front of me.”

Peggy sighed. The labored breathing that had been brought on by the chase masked the sound. The agent took her time approaching the man who was now laid out on the cement dock.

“Afraid not,” Peggy replied.

She crouched down and aimed the barrel of her pistol at the area between the unknown man’s eyes. He didn’t look as though he could do much more than blink up at her in dazed displeasure, but Peggy wasn’t taking any chances.

“It would be in your best interest to hand those files over to my colleague.”

Jarvis moved to the man’s other side to retrieve the weakly offered stack of files. He thumbed through them quickly and nodded to indicate that all seemed to be in order.

“Now, perhaps you’d be so kind as to tell me who you are and how you got those files.”

“Seven,” the man wheezed from his supine position.

“Seven what?” Peggy prompted.

The scientist coughed and it was a deep, rattling sort of sound that expelled a film of blood from his mouth to coat his bottom lip and chin. Jarvis’ unintentional apprehension of the man might have killed him after all.

“Seven,” he repeated.

“Is that a name?” Jarvis asked.

The other man’s head moved in a marginal approximation of a nod.

“Your name?” Peggy continued. She was rewarded with another small nod.

From somewhere down the dock Peggy could hear the crunch of tires on the pavement, but the sound was not accompanied by the wailing of sirens. Not her people, then.

“Who do you work for, Seven, and why do they want those files?” Peggy’s time was running out.

“I think we’re about to have some uninvited guests, Ms. Carter.” Jarvis had fixed his attention on a spot somewhere behind her.

The man called Seven pulled his lips open to form a word, gave another nasty cough, and then tried again. “Er … Erskine.”

Peggy’s blood, which had been hot with anger moments before, ran cold. “What about Dr. Erskine? Is that who you’re working for?”

She knew the answer, of course, because the good doctor was long dead. Seven tried to shake his head; car doors slammed in the near distance. The hand of Seven’s nearest Peggy unfurled jerkily to reveal a previously unnoticed, small, capped syringe.

“Serum,” Seven hissed. “Par … partial …”

Peggy abandoned the gun in her hand in favor of snatching away the syringe. She studied it hastily in the lamplight: it was not quite full of liquid.

“Someone is trying to recreate Dr. Erskine’s serum,” Peggy whispered.

The implications were horrifying. Someone out there knew enough about Project Rebirth to know exactly what files to have stolen, and where to find them; someone was trying to recreate the experiment that had turned small, sweet Steve Rogers into Captain America. Who would have the knowledge and intelligence to do such a thing? Worse, whom would they choose to test it on if they succeeded? Dr. Erskine had hand picked Steve for the exemplary qualities he possessed. There was no way to know who would be doing the picking this time, or what qualities they desired in a test subject.

“Ms. Carter,” Jarvis warned.

A challenge shot rang out in the cool night air; the bullet casing made a muffled tinkling sound as it fell onto the pavement.

“I don’t know what the hell you think you’re doing, but you have ten seconds to bring me those files before I blow your damn heads off.”

Peggy spared a final glance at the man on the ground with the odd moniker. He was dead.

A gun cocked behind Peggy. “Five,” the would-be shooter called menacingly.

“Americans,” Peggy groused as she rose to her feet and turned to face the new arrivals, the syringe clasped tightly in her hand. “Honestly, what is it with you lot and always announcing what you’re going to do before you do it?”

Peggy dove for her discarded weapon. She had counted only three of them, and those were the kind of odds she could work with. The first bullet whizzed through the space she had just vacated, and she yelled for Jarvis to take cover as she clapped a hand around the grip of her pistol. The second bullet nearly took a chunk out of her arm as Peggy leapt to her feet, sighted in on a target, and began firing.

The world narrowed as it always did when Peggy was fighting. Her focus was given wholly to the assessment of threats and anticipation of the movements of her foe as one of the men moved to take her down; she could spare little thought for Jarvis’ well being when she was engaged in looking after her own. She could only hope that he was well, and that he still had the files they’d recovered.

Peggy had almost forgotten about the syringe in her hand when her attacker discovered it. He was a large man, nearly twice her size, and a formidable fighter. He had reached for her wrist – ostensibly to break it – when the plastic cap brushed against his fingers. His expression was triumphant as he made to rip it from Peggy’s fingers.

“I found it, boss!” her attacker yelled. He didn’t seem aware that Peggy had already incapacitated his fellows.

The attacker’s hands were meaty, but the girth of his fingers only served to enhance their strength. Peggy had lost her gun in the scuffle, but she swung ferociously for the side of his head with her free hand; he pulled his head back at the last second and Peggy’s knuckles glanced off of his cheekbone and across his nose, which spurted a crimson line of blood in response.

The plastic syringe cap scraped lightly over the outer curve of Peggy’s palm as it slid off and disappeared, leaving the needle exposed. The sight of it stoked the dying flames of Peggy’s righteous anger.

There would only ever be one Steve Rogers. No one could replace him, and Peggy Carter would give no quarter to would-be imposters.

Jarvis was yelling something unintelligible; her attacker was using his considerable bulk to draw her into what would be a suffocating hold. She had no weapon and little leverage. There was an edge of panic around the adrenaline in her veins now. She could not let this brute and his employer get a hold of the syringe.

Something metal and vaguely tubular arced swiftly through the air and connected soundly with the back of Peggy’s attacker’s head. The man stumbled from the impact and his hands loosened automatically. The sudden absence of the tension that she had been fighting against sent Peggy careening backward to the ground.

By some stroke of luck – “maybe it wasn’t luck at all”, someone would later tell her – Peggy managed to retain ownership of the syringe. Almost better than that realization was the one that came seconds later, when Peggy lifted her eyes from her hand to find that she’d landed not three feet from her misplaced pistol. (“Alright, yeah, that was lucky,” that same person would tell her).

Peggy lunged for her weapon on hands and knees. She couldn’t remember if she’d expended the magazine or not, but prayed fervently that she hadn’t. When she turned it was to find that her attacker had now become Jarvis’ attacker.

Worn down by the mad dash across the docks; mortified at the insinuation that someone might be trying to recreate Dr. Erskine’s serum and all that implied; angry, injured, and desperate as she was, perhaps it wasn’t so unbelievable that this should be the moment that Peggy’s rationality chose to abandon her.

“Hey!” Peggy barked.

Two heads turned to look at her where she sat on her butt on the concrete. Without thought or hesitation, Peggy held up the syringe just high enough that it gleamed dully in the lamplight and then plunged it into the meat of her thigh.

“No!” two voices chorused, one concerned and the other enraged.

Peggy pulled the needle out of her skin. “Move, Mr. Jarvis!” She tossed the now empty syringe into the air, yanked her pistol around into her line of sight, and shot her attacker in the throat.

There was a loud thump as the body toppled over, and then they were engulfed in a blessed silence. Well, near silence, as it was. Peggy’s breathing was harsh and ragged in the stillness, and Jarvis’s was hardly better.

“Are you well, Ms. Carter?” he stammered between heaving breaths.

“Quite, Mr. Jarvis. Thank you.”

Peggy then proceeded to do something she had never done: she twisted to the side and away, and vomited.

Polite as ever, Jarvis waited until she’d emptied the contents of her stomach and then stepped forward to crouch down and offer Peggy his handkerchief, which she took gratefully. When she had cleaned herself up, Jarvis helped her to her feet.

“I’m afraid that was a very foolish thing you did just then, Ms. Carter,” Jarvis said kindly.

Peggy grunted in wordless agreement. Then, “If you’d be so kind as to drive me home, Mr. Jarvis?”

“Certainly.”

They walked together toward the Ford that they had abandoned. Peggy’s left ankle protested anything but the slightest weight, so she had to lean heavily on the arm Jarvis had wrapped supportively around her midsection.

Peggy was staring absently out the window of the Ford as Jarvis navigated the roads back to the Stark estate when she said, to no one in particular, “What a dreadful day.”

 

* * *

 

 

Whatever had been in that syringe turned out to be inert. At least, that was what Peggy surmised when days had passed and nothing had happened. She felt as she always did; there was no sudden influx of stamina or energy, and no changes to her body or mental capacities. She had briefly entertained the idea of relating the tale of her foolishness to Howard in the interest of asking him to test her blood for abnormalities, but then thrown out the idea when she’d remembered that Howard had been the one in possession of a vial of Steve’s blood – which he had lied about. Therefore, aside from Jarvis, no one was the wiser.

In the interest of truth and justice, Peggy did disclose to her superiors at the SSR what she had learned from the man called Seven and posited her theory that someone might be trying to recreate Dr. Erskine’s serum. Her omission of the discovery of the syringe meant that there was little evidence to support her theory, so said superiors left it by the wayside (much as she had expected they would). Peggy might have felt some guilt about her deception if there had been any indicators that the serum had worked. Seven had managed to tell her that it was only a partial replica of the original serum, however, and so Peggy assured herself that there was no harm done and moved on.

At least, she thought she did.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is actually part of the prologue, but I thought that splitting it up would be easier.

**May, 1974**

Peggy was headed for the door of her office with purse in hand when someone knocked. She opened the door to see Hayes, the agent in charge of requisitions, standing before her with his trusted clipboard tucked in against his chest.

“Move along, Hayes,” Peggy said as she breezed right past and started down the hall. “I’m late.”

“Certainly, Director.” Hayes had longer legs, so he kept pace with her easily. “The invoices for the new telephone system have come in and are awaiting your signature; the recommendations for the new trainees were delivered by courier this morning.”

“Where are they?” Peggy queried. An agent saw her coming and stepped out of the way quickly; Peggy smiled at him in thanks.

“Here,” Hayes said, and handed her an unmarked manila envelope.

“Only one?” Peggy queried.

“I believe Mr. Stark and General Phillips sent their candidates in together,” Hayes explained.

Peggy snorted. “Not likely. Very well, Hayes. You may leave the invoices on my desk. I will be out the remainder of the day, but I will go over them first thing tomorrow. Should you need me I’ll be with Mr. Jarvis, I’ve left his number with Rose. Only use it in case of an emergency, Agent Hayes, is that clear?”

“Crystal, ma’am.”

“Good. Thank you, Hayes.”

“My pleasure, Director.” Hayes smiled and spun on his heel to disappear in the direction they had just traveled.

Peggy smiled at his back and then continued on to her car. She’d meant to leave an hour ago, but her last conference call of the day had gone on longer than she’d anticipated. Howard’s connection had been terrible – he was somewhere in Bolivia chasing down some element he swore he needed for weapons development – and Peggy had spent most of her time trying to piece together what Howard was saying with the help of General Phillips.

Jarvis had offered to drive up and retrieve her, sweet man that he was, but Peggy had insisted that she could manage the drive herself. Howard’s mansion wasn’t more than

one hundred miles from the S.H.I.E.L.D. base, and Peggy found that she was looking forward to the drive.

Once in her car, Peggy stowed her purse, double-checked that she had remembered to grab little Tony’s gifts before leaving her house that morning, and then slipped her sunglasses on and headed out.

The drive was cathartic for Peggy. By the time she pulled up the long driveway of the mansion, she felt as relaxed as she could hope to get. She hadn’t lived with Ana and Edwin Jarvis in years and her duties as director of S.H.I.E.L.D. kept her away more often than not, but it still felt like she was coming home.

Peggy had parked and was just stepping out of her Mercedes when a now four-year-old Tony Stark came barreling out of the house.

“Aunt Peggy!” the little boy crowed.

“Hello, darling!” Peggy called fondly.

“You’re here!”

He crashed into her legs with all the exuberance of youth, wrapping his arms around the back of her knees and nearly knocking Peggy over. She laughed and ran a hand through his hair.

“I was told today is Ana’s birthday,” Peggy said slyly.

Tony pulled away from her quickly. “It is not!”

“No? Then whose birthday is it, pray tell?”

“Mine!” Tony grinned proudly and jammed his thumb into his chest as if to reinforce the word.

“Yours? Then it’s a good thing I brought these gifts, isn’t it? Help me carry them in.”

Peggy handed Tony both of his brightly wrapped presents. Jarvis appeared in the doorway just then, and his reprimand for Tony was replaced by a pleased grin as he caught sight of Peggy.

“Ms. Carter,” Jarvis said warmly. “I was about to begin worrying.”

“Meetings,” Peggy said with some disgust.

Tony ran into the house ahead of them with his arms full of Peggy’s gifts. A surprised shout sounded; moments later Ana Jarvis appeared at the other end of the entryway.

“Ms. Carter, how wonderful!”

Peggy was prepared for the enthusiastic hug that Ana bestowed on her, and she returned it with real affection. Ana Jarvis was one of the few people in the world that Peggy had become accustomed to hugging.

“Oh, you must be so uncomfortable under that awful makeup. Go wash up. We’ll wait for you on the patio.” Ana smiled and then patted Peggy’s arm before turning to her husband. “If you’ll bring the cake, Mr. Jarvis.”

“Certainly, my dear.”

Peggy’s heart was light as she turned and headed for the bathroom. She could hear Tony talking to Ana as they made their way in the opposite direction, toward the patio, and sighed contentedly. This wasn’t her house, but these people were her home.

In the bathroom, Peggy retrieved a washcloth and began the task of removing her makeup. Ana was right: she was uncomfortable, but it was a discomfort that she’d acclimated to over the years. In many ways, living with the nuisance of heavy makeup was nothing compared to living with the knowledge of what it hid.

Peggy had been in her late forties before it had occurred to her that anything was amiss, and even then the realization had only come after repeated comments and inquiries from others.

“Oh, you look wonderful!” they’d say. “Your skin is so perfect! How do you keep it that way?”

And, “No, surely you can’t be that old! You don’t look a day over thirty, truly.”

Peggy’s life was a chaotic rush from one averted crisis to another. She thought she could be forgiven for not paying much attention to her features, but after many such comments (and others along the same vein), she’d begun to pay attention in earnest. Not just to herself, but to her peers; what she’d seen had frightened her deeply.

By the time her fifty-first birthday rolled around, Peggy Carter knew that something about her had changed. Those comments hadn’t been empty flattery: she truly did look just as she had at thirty years old. Her skin was unlined and glowing with health; her hair was the same chestnut color that it’d always been, without a single trace of gray to be found. Not only did she not look old, she didn’t feel old either: her reaction times hadn’t slowed at all, and the joint pains that most people her age complained of were nonexistent. In fact, Peggy felt wonderful.

Naturally, in her terror Peggy had turned to her truest friend: Jarvis. Though he’d been surprised by her fear, he hadn’t been surprised by her panicked explanation. His face had been as open and gentle as ever as he’d explained that he’d noticed the lack of change in her, and that he’d assumed that she’d noticed before then as well.

“But I don’t understand it, Mr. Jarvis!” Peggy had exclaimed. “What is this, how did it happen?”

To which the wonderfully rational butler had answered with a brief reminder of that ridiculously foolish moment Peggy had indulged one night on a pier, when she’d injected herself with some bastardization of the serum that had turned Steve Rogers into Captain America. Peggy had tried to argue that the serum was incomplete and had been inert, but it was hard to do so when the proof of its effectiveness literally stared her in the face on a daily basis. The contents of that syringe hadn’t been ineffective then, but on some sort of delayed release, and the effects had finally settled in.

There was little Peggy could do at that point. Aside from Jarvis, no one knew about that night on the pier and Peggy knew that confessing now would only put her in danger. Even those closest to her would want to subject her to a slew of tests; they might even want to try to recreate the serum, or the effects, in what they would ostensibly call “an effort to understand what was happening to her”, but would undoubtedly turn into an attempt to do something wholly different.

Peggy might have forgotten about injecting herself, but she’d never forgotten her fierce desire to protect Steve and the experiment that had changed him. She’d never forgotten the man with the numbered moniker – Seven – or all of her failed attempts to track down his employer and the creator of the mock-serum. The moment Peggy had realized that said serum had worked, she’d also realized that it was possible she was the only proof that it had – and that she could never tell anyone.

Telling Ana had been a risk, but one that even Jarvis had agreed was necessary. Ana had been the one to teach Peggy how to age herself with her makeup: how to draw in lines on her face where there were none, how to shadow and contour in a way that would add depth and imitate the passage of time. She’d even helped Peggy dye a gray streak into her hair to complete the façade.

“You’ll have to learn to do all of this by yourself,” Ana had told her kindly. “I’m afraid I won’t always be around to help you.”

That was Peggy’s first true, awful reminder of what the serum had done to her. She’d been so desperate to hide the implications – to make sure that no one realized she’d irrevocably changed – that she hadn’t taken the time to understand that the serum would soon rob her of everything, and everyone, she knew. She might not be aging, but the people she loved were: the gray in Jarvis’ hair was not fake, and the lines on Ana’s face

were not makeup. Even little Tony Stark was changing and growing … but Peggy was not.

Now, it was only in the safety of her own home or the presence of her friends that Peggy could be herself: a fifty-three year old woman who looked as though she’d just celebrated her thirtieth birthday and did everything she could not to think about what exactly that meant.

When her face was free of makeup and clean once more, Peggy joined Jarvis, Ana, and Tony on the patio. Well, Ana and Jarvis were on the patio: Tony, impatient and tired of waiting for her, had changed into his swim trunks and jumped into the pool. His pile of presents sat waiting on a nearby table.

“Done, Aunt Peggy?” Tony yelled when he spotted her.

“I’m done, darling. Come in so I can have some of this delicious cake.”

“Can I open my presents?”

“Of course you can,” Ana answered brightly.

So Tony abandoned the pool in favor of presents, and the four of them spent hours on the patio. They had cake, and watched Tony play with his gifts, and laughed; when Jarvis declared that it was time for the birthday boy to go to bed they moved inside.

Though the adults had continued to enjoy each other’s company, Ana excused herself sometime before midnight to check once more that a room had been made up for Peggy. Before long, Peggy and Jarvis’s conversation came around to the same thing it always did: Peggy’s unique situation.

“I just wish we had some assurances that the serum wasn’t causing some irreparable damage, that’s all,” Jarvis said. They’d had the same argument countless times. “If you’d just tell Mr. Stark, perhaps …”

“No,” Peggy retorted without heat. “You know my thoughts on this subject, Mr. Jarvis.”

“I simply worry, Ms. Carter. We have no idea what that serum is doing to you, or even what it is.”

“Other than the blasted fountain of youth, apparently.”

Peggy knew that a majority of people would be ecstatic to find themselves in her position. Eternal youth was the pipe dream of many, after all; Peggy could think of nothing more horrid. To know that everyone around her was marching toward a finish

line that she might never see … that one day she would look up and find herself in a new place, without those she loved and trusted …

Peggy physically shook herself out of those thoughts. “Well, we know that it doesn’t make me invincible or give me super strength.”

“Or super speed,” Jarvis added. Peggy had been overpowered and injured enough in the intervening years – she’d been shot in the shoulder just the year before – that they could say such things with certainty.

“In fact, the only thing it does seem to do is keep me young.”

“Well, on an external level, at least. We have no idea what it’s doing to you on a cellular level.”

Peggy arched an unimpressed eyebrow at Jarvis’s attempt to score a point in favor of his “tell Howard” argument. The butler wasn’t remotely abashed.

They sat in silence for some minutes, until Jarvis quietly asked, “What will you do?”

The words brought tears to Peggy’s eyes. She focused on the small, half-moon table that sat against the opposite wall: it was full of pictures, mostly of Tony and Ana and Jarvis, but there were a few of Tony with his parents as well. This wasn’t Howard’s LA mansion, where Peggy had lived with Ana and Jarvis for several years, but it was just as familiar. She had spent the majority of her free time here in the last decade or so. Jarvis had long since given up his part in their adventures, but he was still Peggy’s right hand; he was still the one that patched her up when she couldn’t do it herself; her advisor; her truest friend.

What was she going to do when the inevitable day came, and she couldn’t hide her differences anymore? What was she going to do when the only options left to her were to tell the truth about what had happened to her, or disappear? She couldn’t tell the truth – she knew it down to the marrow of her bones – but the idea of leaving was barely more acceptable.

Peggy was running out of time, though, and they all knew it. Makeup and hair dye could only go so far.

“I don’t know,” she whispered in a voice thick with tears. “I wish to God I’d never touched that syringe.”

A few seconds passed in silence. The empty couch cushion next to Peggy dipped suddenly, and she raised her head to find that Jarvis had come to sit next to her. He slid one of his hands beneath hers and wrapped his fingers around it to give it a reassuring

squeeze. Peggy tried to smile, but she couldn’t stop thinking about his hands were changing: still capable, still steady and familiar, but undeniably older.

“I have known from the moment that I met you, Ms. Carter, that you were meant for more than a mundane life. I think you were meant to find that serum.”

“Why?”

“I’m afraid I can’t say. But I truly believe the world needs you, and that the reasons for that will become clear, in time.”

“I do hope you’re right, Mr. Jarvis.”

The sound of a car door opening arrested their conversation. It was a soft click, not much of a noise at all, and clearly meant to be unnoticed; Peggy straightened up immediately and glanced swiftly at Jarvis to see that he’d heard it as well. They stood quickly and all of Peggy’s muscles coiled in tense anticipation as she made her way to the door with quiet efficiency.

She peered carefully through the window. There was a dark figure near the open door of her car; the stranger was bent over and half inside her car on the passenger’s side, and Peggy knew from the outline that the stranger was a man.

The only thing in her car that he could possibly be after was her briefcase. Peggy thought quickly over what was in there: the candidate recommendations Hayes had given her earlier, a request for a personnel transfer she had yet to approve, and … her personal file on Seven and honest account of what had happened that night on the pier! That file was the only one in existence that held the truth of the incident, as well as all of the data and leads Peggy had personally (and privately) amassed over the years. She’d only brought it because she intended to ask Jarvis to keep it safe for her.

Who in the world was this stranger and how the hell did he know about her personal file?

“He’s after my briefcase,” Peggy told Jarvis as she retrieved the gun out of her purse. “My personal files are in there. He must not be allowed to leave with them. Arm yourself, Mr. Jarvis. Get Ana and Tony to safety; there may be more of them.”

Peggy barely waited for Jarvis to nod before she opened the door and barreled out into the driveway. Her appearance startled the would-be thief into smacking his head on the roof of her car as he straightened; Peggy’s briefcase was clasped in one hand.

“Beautiful night for a heist,” Peggy said conversationally. Her weapon was aimed at the man’s face. She didn’t take her attention off of him as she approached. “Perhaps I can help you. Why don’t you tell me what you’re after and why, and I’ll help you leave the property alive.”

The stranger stared at her. Then, without warning, he threw something about the size of a baseball into the air between them. Peggy barely had time to think the word “grenade” before she turned and ran for the nearest cover.

The windows on the ground floor exploded; the debris sliced Peggy’s uncovered arms as she shielded her head. She shook the shards of glass off and stood as soon as the concussive blast had died out. Her ears were ringing, but Peggy blinked her eyes and willed her equilibrium to even out as she scanned the property for her attacker.

Small spots of fire had erupted all over the lawn, and the light from the flames gave her just enough light to see the blurry figure racing for the fence line. Peggy took off in that direction as fast as her legs would carry her. When she was close enough, she leveled her weapon at the man and fired off a volley of shots.

At least one of the bullets must have connected, because he stumbled mid-stride and landed roughly on his knees. Peggy shot again in an attempt to delay him; he ducked to the side to dodge the bullet, and that was delay enough. She launched herself at him.

Peggy’s right shoulder connected with him at center of mass. The stranger jerked sharply as they tumbled forward; Peggy’s gun flew out of her hand as she latched an arm around his midsection. The man landed face down, but his bulk pinned Peggy’s arm between his chest and the ground. They struggled mightily against each other: the stranger tried to toss her off of him even as Peggy fought to both pin him down and regain use of her pinned arm.

The stranger took advantage of Peggy’s predicament by yanking an elbow up and back, catching her soundly across the jaw and knocking her sideways. She recovered quickly, but he was already on his feet and running for the perimeter again. Peggy’s briefcase was still in his hand.

Peggy was on her feet when a side door on the mansion swung open. Jarvis stepped out into the yard, one hand extended with something she couldn’t see, and aimed it directly at the thief. For a breath nothing happened; then a violent shudder shook the man from head to toe and he fell unmoving to the grass.

She huffed a relieved sigh and started forward; behind her, a pillar of heat and light split the darkness as her Mercedes exploded.

Peggy and Jarvis threw themselves to the ground. Long seconds passed in which they waited for any secondary explosions, but nothing happened. She held her breath and raised her head: their would-be thief was still immobile on the ground, and though the car had thrown debris all over the grounds it didn’t appear to have started any secondary fires or explosions.

“Mr. Jarvis?” she hollered.

“Fine,” he answered immediately. The butler picked himself up off the ground and looked in her direction as she did the same.

“Where are the others?” Peggy refrained from naming Ana and Tony. If they were lucky and the stranger wasn’t alone, his cohorts would take ‘others’ to mean reinforcements and not civilians.

Jarvis understood. “Waiting for orders.”

Peggy sighed in relief. "Good. Now, what is it you did to our thieving friend here?"

Jarvis held out the device he still held in one hand. Small and rectangular, there were only two buttons on the top: one red and one green. This close Peggy could see that there was an opening on the top ridge where something like a cartridge had once been. She studied the empty spot and then traced a line back to the fallen thief where, sure enough, a thin metal cartridge was sticking out of his arm.

"Mr. Stark's newest improvement on a taser," Jarvis explained. "He's awake but immobilized for another …" and here he checked his watch, "two minutes."

Peggy nodded once and moved to crouch next to the stranger. He'd fallen on his side, so she pushed him over onto his back. His eyes followed her.

"You blew up my car," Peggy said. "Such a shame. I liked that car." She wrenched the briefcase from his hand, the muscles of which had frozen closed around the handle.

Her car, which was still burning in the driveway, cast flickering orange light around the yard. Peggy used that light to do a quick check of her briefcase's content. She closed it again when she was certain that her files were secure inside.

"I'm afraid we don't have much time," Jarvis informed her. "Those explosions are bound to have woken everyone within a mile radius. The authorities will be here soon."

The stranger's arm jerked. Peggy took that as a sign that the paralytic effect of the taser was wearing off and turned her attention to the man.

"Now, let's try this again, shall we? Who are you and what do you want with my things?"

There was no answer. Peggy wasn’t certain if the stranger simply wasn’t answering, or wasn’t able to answer because he was still partially paralyzed. To that end, she curled a hand into a fist and snapped it suddenly toward the stranger’s face as though she intended to strike him; the stranger flinched. Peggy smiled triumphantly.

“Who are you?” she demanded.

The stranger held up his hand with four fingers extended.

“Four. Four what? Four words? Four letters?” Peggy hounded him.

The wail of sirens sounded in the distance. Peggy glanced up at Jarvis, who had turned his attention to some point in the distance.

“Ms. Carter,” he warned.

“Who are you?” Peggy demanded again.

The man nodded toward his outstretched fingers.

“Four.” Peggy’s mouth slackened as she put it together. “Your name is Four.”

The man opened his mouth, but no answer was forthcoming. When he didn’t close it again, Peggy chanced leaning forward. What she saw was a mutilated stump where Four’s tongue had once been. Peggy huffed in irritation.

Four’s body jerked violently. His muscles contracted and he went rigid for several seconds; by the time the spasm passed only the whites of his eyes were discernible. He was dead.

“Mr. Jarvis! What did you do?”

“I assure you, I had nothing to do with whatever that was! Cyanide, perhaps?”

Peggy checked, but she knew it hadn’t been cyanide. There was no foam in his mouth, or moisture of any kind left for that matter.

The sirens were getting closer.

“Ms. Carter.” Jarvis discarded the device in his hands in favor of grabbing Peggy by the biceps and guiding her to her feet. He didn’t let go, but instead peered into her face with grave sincerity. “You must run. Now, before the authorities arrive.”

Peggy’s eyes went wide. “What? What do you mean, run?”

“You have just been attacked. The authorities are on their way right now, and the first thing they’re going to do is question you. You’re bleeding; they’ll want to check you over and administer first aid. When they get here those cops are going to give you exactly what you don’t want: attention. They’ll want to investigate, Ms. Carter, and I fear that such an investigation will end badly for you.”

“That very well may be, Mr. Jarvis, but I can’t just disappear into the night like a criminal, can I?”

“Why not?”

Peggy might have scoffed at him if Jarvis’s expression hadn’t been so earnest. She stared at him in disbelief as the weight of what he was implying began to settle around her like a shroud. Her trusted friend was advising her to go on the run – to abandon her life and disappear.

“I can’t.” The words wavered as they filled the space between them.

The sirens weren’t far off now.

Jarvis released her biceps and pulled himself up straight the way he did when Tony needed a particularly firm talking to.

“There is nothing but pain left here for you. If you stay, you will be forced to watch as those you love grow old and, eventually, die; you will be forced to continue living a half-life, to hide who you are and what you can do, just as you did when we first met. I know you, Ms. Carter. Those bonds will chafe more than ever, now that you know what it’s like to be truly without them. If you stay, you’ll only doom yourself to a life of misery.”

Peggy shuffled her weight from one foot to the other as the sharp sting of tears blurred her vision. The emergency vehicles were barely blocks away now; her car was a flaming mess of twisted metal in the driveway, and the shattered glass from the first floor windows of the mansion glittered in the firelight.

“But …” Peggy choked, and the first tears spilled over. “What of Tony, and Ana? I can’t just abandon my work, and S.H.I.E.L.D. …”

“Ana will know, if it will ease your mind, but Tony cannot. If you run – if the world thinks you’re dead – you can chase down those numbered men without restraint. You can find the man behind the serum and stop him from using it on anyone else. But most importantly, you may live a life.” Here Jarvis tried for a tremulous smile, but he too was restraining tears. “I have known from the moment I met you, Margaret Carter, that you were meant for more than anyone could imagine.”

Peggy laughed thickly at the unexpected use of her full name. Then, without warning, she threw her arms around her friend even as her heart tripled in weight. They had both known, of course, that they were fast approaching the moment when Peggy would have to decide whether to leave or give up the lie. Now that it was here, however, the moment was more unbearable than either of them could have imagined.

"Fate led you to that serum, Ms. Carter, and one day I think you'll know why. The world needs you, and I, for one, will feel safer knowing you're out there. Go; I'll handle the authorities."

Peggy released her friend and stepped back. At the end of the road, headlights cut paths out of the darkness as the piercing shrill of sirens accosted their ears.

"Here." Jarvis whipped out his wallet and emptied it of cash, which he gave to Peggy.

Peggy tucked the money into her pocket. "Hug Ana and Tony for me."

"Every day," Jarvis promised. "Now run."

So she did.

* * *

 

**February, 1975**

Nine months after the death of Margaret Carter, Edwin Jarvis received a postcard. The front of the card proclaimed in colorful letters, "Wish you were here!" The postmark said it had come from somewhere in Romania; a small, capital P – easily overlooked – was written in one corner.

Jarvis smiled and hid it with its predecessors in the briefcase that the authorities had never recovered.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys ... I know ... I haven't updated this thing in almost TWO YEARS. I lost motivation for a while (and my muse) but I still love this idea and I mean to finish this story.

** August, 2013 **

****

There was a coffee shop a few blocks from his apartment that Steve liked to frequent. The atmosphere was warm and informal: the walls had been painted with chalkboard paint and guests were encouraged to write or draw whatever they wanted (as long as it was appropriate, of course), and at the end of every week the board would be cleared in preparation for the next week. They also had a jukebox, which Steve had spent plenty of money on since he’d first discovered the place.

His free time was severely limited these days, and his anonymity even more so, but Steve refused to give up his trips to the coffee shop. After the first two or three times he’d shown his face there after the events in New York people had stopped gawking at him like a circus sideshow. Now, he was just another guy in a baseball cap with a favorite corner booth and a, “hey, Steve. The regular?”

Tony would call him a fool, and Natasha would call him worse, but Steve trusted the people at his coffee shop. The place wasn’t big enough to garner excessive attention, and the overwhelming percentage of patrons were regulars just like Steve; by unspoken decree, everyone seemed to acknowledge who he was and then proceed to leave him alone. That was why, when Phil Coulson had called and asked for a favor, Steve had given the other man the address of the coffee shop and a time to meet.

Steve was halfway through his first cup of coffee when Coulson slid easily into the booth across from him.

“I like it here,” Coulson commented as he adjusted his tie and swept his eyes over the shop. “Good atmosphere.”

 A barista appeared at the end of the table. “Morning,” she said brightly. “What can I get ya?”

“Hanna,” Steve said with a respectful tip of his head.

“I’ll have a latte,” Coulson answered with a smile.

“Latte, gotcha. You ready for that refill, Steve?”

Steve finished the rest of his coffee with a gulp and then handed the mug to Hanna. “Am now.”

Hanna grinned. “Great, be right back.”

“You draw that?” Coulson asked when Hanna had disappeared. He motioned to the bit of chalkboard near Steve’s head, where he had drawn a little monkey with a top hat earlier in the week.

“Just something to keep my hands busy. You wanted a favor?”

Coulson stared at him for a second before producing a small tablet. Steve was familiar with the handheld data devices, but had never felt the need to purchase one for himself and had repeatedly shot down all of Tony’s attempts to give him one. Despite that, he took the device from Coulson when the other man held it out for him.

“Six months ago,” Coulson began softly, “my team had a run in with a young man who had above average strength and an unfortunate number of deformities.”

Phil caught sight of Hanna moving toward them from the bar and stopped speaking. He thanked the young woman warmly, as did Steve, and then waited until she’d left again to resume his story.

“He took some convincing, but finally agreed to the help we were offering. When I asked him how he’d come by such considerable strength, the man admitted that he’d been approached by a man some months ago who went only by the name Three.”

“Three?” Steve repeated. He kept his eyes on Coulson over the rim of his coffee mug as he took a hesitant sip.

“Three,” Coulson confirmed. “He said Three promised to change his life, and that when he agreed Three gave him the address to a warehouse. He went to the warehouse, was jumped, and then woke up days later alone, deformed, and strong enough to play baseball with SUV’s.”

An uncomfortable zap of cold electricity sped down Steve’s spine. He sat up straight without thinking and cast his eyes quickly around the coffee shop.

Coulson reacted immediately, straightening up in his seat the same way Steve had. “What is it?” he asked lowly.

“Nothing,” Steve assured him. “Just have a bad feeling about this story.”

Coulson relaxed minutely and covered his sudden change in demeanor by taking a long drink from his latte. “I felt the same way, so I had my scientists run a full diagnostic on his blood and tissue samples. Then I had them cross check the results with those of every powered person and Inhuman we have on record.”

Phil’s voice had gradually lowered in pitch, and at this pause Steve realized that he had taken to leaning heavily on the table to keep track with what was being said. He righted himself as casually as he could.

“Maybe we should continue this elsewhere,” Steve suggested.

Coulson shook his head once. “We’re good,” he said confidently. He waved a hand at the cell phone that he’d placed on the tabletop at some point. “Multi-frequency scrambler and short range service interrupter, effective within a one mile range, courtesy of Fitzsimmons. I had a team in here to sweep for bugs an hour ago.”

Steve chuckled and shook his head. “No one can ever accuse you of being bad at your job.”

“No one should know I’m doing it, if I’m doing it well.”

“Fair point. So, what did the test results tell you?"

“That our unfortunate young test subject had roughly half of his DNA severely altered, and of that half, nearly twenty five percent of those new genetic markers were found to exist in only one other person.”

Just like that, Steve knew. He knew where this was going, and what Coulson was going to say, and why he’d called Steve specifically to ask for this favor.

“Me.”

“You,” Coulson confirmed.

“Someone out there is trying to recreate Dr. Erskine’s formula,” Steve said.

“We can only guess at their purpose, I’m afraid. The young man died of his deformities – his body was too mangled for even our best doctors – and all of the information he left us has led to dead ends.”

Steve sighed heavily and pushed himself back into the booth cushions. He drank half of his coffee in two gulps and then rubbed his palms over the jeans on his thighs. He didn’t know why he’d never considered the possibility of someone trying to recreate the serum that had made him Captain America, but he hadn’t. Dr. Erskine had been killed, and then the country had been focused on the war, and then Steve had dug himself an icy grave and spent seven decades as a memory in the minds of those he’d loved and lost.

When he’d woken in that mock hospital room things like serums and super soldiers didn’t seem to matter anymore. Steve had woken to find himself alone and torn from not just the only life he’d ever known or wanted, but from the only woman he’d ever wanted it with. He’d died with Peggy Carter’s voice in his ear and been resurrected to find her “Missing in Action, Presumed Dead”, declared some twenty years ago.

What did the world need with super soldiers, anyway, in this age of gods and men in flying metal suits? Steve was a remnant of days long past, the weapon of a different war.

Coulson had finished his coffee during the time Steve had been lost to his thoughts. The sound of his coffee mug hitting the thick wooden tabletop was what finally drew Steve back into the present. He looked up in time to see Coulson incline his head toward the data pad Steve had laid off to one side.

“That has everything we know on it. All of the test results, the surveillance videos from our conversations, and every lead we’ve followed. It’s password protected, of course, coded to your unique fingerprint and voice pattern.”

Coulson had begun to gather himself and scoot toward the end of the booth. He grabbed his phone – which Steve now gathered wasn’t really a phone at all – and shook his head as he slipped it into his pocket.

“I’d never live it down if I forgot it,” he explained.

“Why tell me all of this?” Steve asked suddenly. “What is it you expect me to do?”

Coulson studied him quietly. Then, with his characteristic air of easy reassurance, he said, “That’s up to you. I just know that if our situations were reversed, and it was me, I’d want to know. So I thought you would too.”

“Does Fury know you’re giving me this?” Steve motioned to the data pad.

“Tell Tony next time he decides to give you a gift to put a little more thought into it. StarkPads are so last year.”

Steve couldn’t stop the lopsided grin that pulled at his lips. Even when he was the bearer of bad news Steve genuinely enjoyed the other man’s presence.

“Have I mentioned how glad I am that you’re alive?”

“Every time you see me,” Coulson shot back as he pulled a set of aviator sunglasses from inside his suit jacket. “But it’s nice to hear.”

Coulson strode confidently out of the coffee shop without a goodbye or a backward glance. Steve watched the agent until he was out of sight, his mind spinning with all that he’d learned in the last thirty minutes; the idea of staying in the coffee shop made Steve feel claustrophobic, so he grabbed the data pad and his baseball cap, added his tip to Coulson’s (somewhat exorbitant) one, and left.

Steve thought about going back to his apartment and then promptly turned and started walking in the other direction. He needed to clear his head and come to terms with what this new information could mean before he started digging through it.

Steve was careful to keep his head down as he went. New York was notoriously easy to get lost in, because most of her inhabitants were too busy to notice anything less than aliens falling from the sky, but he was in no mood to take chances with being recognized. The data pad tucked securely between his arm and his body, Steve looked just like countless other people he passed. He could have been just like them – been any one of them, on their way to college classes, or headed home to burgeoning families; could have been, but wasn’t.

What the hell was he going to do about this possible new serum? There was a possibility that whoever was attempting to develop it was as benevolent as Dr. Erskine, but Coulson’s story about the mutilated young man told Steve that wasn’t the case. Even if it was, was he really willing to take the chance of having another person like him running around? The answer was no. There was also the small matter of the danger this new serum presented: whoever was trying to recreate it had apparently only been partly successful if the subject came out of the test with deformities that would ultimately kill them.

The question wasn’t really whether or not Steve was going to do something about the situation, but what he was going to do, and how he was going to go about it. He considered telling the team and then quickly threw the idea away. Coulson had singled him out, and until he had something to go on there wasn’t much the Avenger’s could help him with – assuming they cared to help at all.

Steve immediately chided himself for the unjust nature of that thought. They were a ragtag bunch, certainly, and as dangerous in their own ways as any threat they’d faced, but they were good people at heart. They also happened to be the only friends Steve had in this new life.

When the sun was well past high noon and Steve’s stomach began to growl in earnest, Steve turned back in the direction of his apartment. He was farther than he’d intended to be, farther even than he’d realized; he considered jogging, but knew that would draw unwanted attention because all of the weaving in and out of crowds he’d have to do. With a quiet heave, Steve resigned himself to the walk home.

The afternoon was giving way to early evening by the time his apartment came into view. Steve stopped to grab a sub and fries from the bistro on the corner before heading upstairs and tapping a finger against the data pad’s screen to bring it to life. The word PASSCODE glared up at him. Steve placed his thumb on the square button at the bottom of the screen and waited for the next prompt.

The words NAME AND SERVICE NUMBER appeared. Feeling rather foolish, Steve spoke his name and military service number into the quiet stillness of his apartment. The data pad made an audible click as the screen flashed. The S.H.I.E.L.D. logo and half a dozen icons for different programs replaced the plain background; Steve was momentarily discouraged until he realized that each icon had been named for what it held.

Truly starved now, Steve decided to put off diving into the files long enough to eat, which he did with ravenous gusto. At least the food hadn’t changed much in seventy years.

When he was done, he started with the video files. He wanted to be able to put a face to a name. The videos were numbered, so Steve started with the first one and retreated to his couch. He kicked off his shoes and curled his legs beneath him on the cushions as Coulson’s voice filtered out from the data pad’s speakers.

“I’m Phil. You are?” The young man stared silently at Coulson. “We’re not going to hurt you. In fact, we’d like to help you, if we can.”

The nameless man sneered, but even through second hand observation Steve could see that Coulson’s words had caught his attention. He was trying to appear hardened, but the hope wouldn’t be repressed.

“Phil,” the man repeated. His tone was scratchy. “No title?”

Coulson grinned and shrugged. “Would you feel better if I had one?”

A pause; then, “No. My name is Paul Statler, and I don’t think you can help me. No one can.”

The man – Paul had been looking down at the table and the angle had hidden his face; now, he raised his chin to look Coulson in the face. When Coulson didn’t react to the odd angle of his nose, which had clearly been broken and improperly reset, or the crooked set of his jaw, Paul pulled both of his arms up and laid them on the table. They were covered in scars; his elbows were turned at the wrong angle; his left hand was missing several fingers.

“How did this happen, Paul? Who did this to you?”

“Some guy approached me in a bar. Said he could change my life. Well, he wasn’t wrong – my life has certainly changed.”

“What did he offer you?”

“I told you – a new life. He said he worked for a drug company that wanted to do drug trials with some new wonder drug. You know how it is – the cure for cancer and all of that.”

“What was this man’s name?” Coulson asked on the video.

“Three.”

Coulson paused. Then, “Three?”

Paul’s laugh was rough and bitter. The sound was not one of mirth; it bounced off of the walls of Steve’s quiet apartment and filled it in a way that made him strangely uncomfortable. For a moment, Steve couldn’t place his strange reaction. Then, he remembered where he’d heard such a dead laugh before: years ago, in a war where evil men laughed in the face of the transgressions placed at their feet.

“All of that – all of this,” and here Paul motioned to himself – or, more accurately, to his deformities – “and that’s the part you choose to focus on? I threw a car fifty feet; some freak who wants to call himself by a number barely registers on the ‘Strange Shit Going On’ scale, Phil.”

“Of course not,” Coulson agreed diplomatically. “Please, continue.”

Steve listened as Paul Statler continued to talk, but his attention never quite left Coulson’s image on the screen. The agent did a commendable job of paying attention to what was being said and engaging with Paul, but Steve knew that Coulson’s mind was still preoccupied with the idea of this “Three”.

Steve knew, because his mind had immediately seized on that information as well. Why would the man call himself Three? Was there some significance to the number? If there was a Three, did that mean there was a One, or a Two? How high did the numbers go?

Another number came to mind suddenly, and a stabbing pain to the heart with it: thirteen. Agent Thirteen, to be specific – one of Peggy’s aliases from the war. For the span of several breaths, Steve couldn’t focus. The pain in his heart doubled and expanded until his nerve endings felt like exposed wires. Sixty years had passed for the world, but Steve saw her in his mind’s eye as though it had only been hours: Peggy’s bright red lips and luminous eyes, full of both challenge and understanding and something private that made Steve’s blood rush in his ears.

He longed for those moments. Not the war – never the war – but those treasured moments when Steve looked at Peggy and the rest of the world just sort of fell away. Steve longed for Peggy with a ferocity that threatened to break him in ways no miracle serum could repair.

All of a sudden, Steve dropped the data pad onto his couch and swept to his feet. He was not given to pacing, but he needed the motion to reinforce his attempts to push the specter of Peggy from his mind.

Agent Thirteen was an alias that Peggy had used in an official capacity. What if Three was an alias as well, and one being used in an official capacity?

Steve’s thoughts continued on in such a fashion for some minutes before, inevitably, circling back to what he was trying desperately not to think of: Peggy. Eventually, he gave up trying to be productive at all and retreated to bed, where he tossed and turned for hours.

When Steve finally succeeded in drifting off into sleep, his dreams were full of the woman he’d loved – and lost.

 

 

 

           

**Author's Note:**

> So I told myself that I wouldn't post this until it was finished.  
> I'm a liar.  
> In my defense, I am just so excited about this story and I really want to share it with you all - I hope that you are excited for it as well. And I do have several chapters finished, so I'm not a *total* liar.


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